Fans at the Super Bowl got a face full of sun on the eastern side of Levi's Stadium.

Fans at the Super Bowl got a face full of sun on the eastern side of Levi's Stadium.

Photo: Peter Fimrite

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Fans at the Super Bowl got a face full of sun on the eastern side of Levi's Stadium.

Fans at the Super Bowl got a face full of sun on the eastern side of Levi's Stadium.

Photo: Peter Fimrite

Image 3 of 3

Super Bowl fans get taste of famous Levi’s Stadium sun blast

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Out-of-towners visiting Levi’s Stadium for Super Bowl 50 got the face full of intense sun that some 49ers fans have complained about since the shadeless, bowl-shaped arena opened in 2014.

And while many suffered through Sunday’s unseasonable February temperatures, others shrugged off the heat and basked in the revelry of the game.

The sun, as usual, was blaring through the first half of the game on the east side of the stadium, where uninitiated fans shaded their eyes and squinted to see the action.

“That’s the problem, the sun,” said Mark Ihlenburg, 35, a Broncos fan from Sugar Hill, Ga., as he held his hand to his forehead to block the rays. “It’s a little bright. I heard that 49ers fans were upset about that, but I didn’t realize how bad it was until I got inside the stadium.”

Melissa Krause, 41, a self-described Broncos “super fan” from San Diego, was slathered in sunscreen, but couldn’t do anything about the heat.

“We were joking about how the NFL is so powerful that they can control the weather because it was so bad before and now its just gorgeous weather,” Krause said.

Then she paused, tilted her head and let a wry smile crease her face: “The sun, it’s pretty intense. Yeah, I’d say its a little warm.”

Temperatures in the South Bay were record-tying for the day, hitting 76 degrees in San Jose, the closest official measuring site to the stadium, according to the National Weather Service.

That heat made the stadium feel more like an early-season scorcher, in which temperatures regularly shoot into the 80s, rather than the February NFL season-capper.

Jacob Batarse, a 24-year-old Panthers fan from Torreón, Mexico, was one of scores of others with no complaints about the sun. He was feeling no pain as he heckled Broncos fans all around him.

“It’s amazing,” he said, unconcerned as the Broncos took an early lead. “The atmosphere, the fans, the stadium, all of it.”

“The sun’s fine,” said Kathi Colby, 44, of Redding, Conn., who came with her husband and three children, all of them dressed in orange. “We’d be in Vermont skiing right now if we weren’t here, so we don’t mind the heat.”

Her husband, Mike Colby, 45, was sporting a giant orange afro wig and was too busy shouting and waving his arms in support of the Broncos to notice the sun glaring in his eyes before it went down.

“We’re the only people in Connecticut who root for the Broncos,” Mike Colby said between shouts. “We’re not shy about it.”